Gender Differences in Self-Employment in Finnish Regions
Abstract
Many studies show that gender predicts entries into self-employment – females are typically a minority of self-employed. Men also have a higher probability of remaining in business than women. In many countries, however, females represent the fastest growing segment among the self-employed. The reasons that lead women and men to enter self-employment can be very different, and may also differ between regions. A well-known but little understood fact is that rates of entrepreneurship exhibit pronounced and persistent variations across regions. The specification and understanding of regional entrepreneurial environments remains a complex issue. The aim of this paper is to throw some light on gender differences in entrepreneurship in Finland and its regions. Are there gender differences in self-employment rates, and if there are, for what reason? How do female entrepreneurs differ from male entrepreneurs with regard to predicted income, personal and household characteristics, assets, prior activity and industry? What is the husband’s role in the household? Personal characteristics such as family size, marital status, and the presence and ages of children may play different role for women than they do for men. We intend to apply the structural probit model to female self-employment in order to test the hypothesis whether an individual is more likely to be self-employed the greater is the predicted relative income in self-employment. Our data set is based on a Longitudinal Census File and the Longitudinal Employment Statistics File constructed by Statistics Finland. Since 1987, the two basic files are updated annually in Finland. These two register-based data sets, together with some other registers, provide panel data on each resident of Finland, from which a 7 per cent random sample is taken for this study. The data set is very rich including hundreds and hundreds of variables for 1987-2002.Download Info
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.Bibliographic Info
Paper provided by European Regional Science Association in its series ERSA conference papers with number ersa06p380.Length:
Date of creation: Aug 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa06p380
Contact details of provider:
Postal: Augasse 2-6, 1090 Vienna, Austria
Web page: http://www.ersa.org
Related research
Keywords:This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
- NEP-ALL-2007-08-27 (All new papers)
- NEP-ENT-2007-08-27 (Entrepreneurship)
References
References listed on IDEASPlease report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Hannu Tervo, 2006. "Regional unemployment, self-employment and family background," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 38(9), pages 1055-1062.
- Evans, David S & Jovanovic, Boyan, 1989. "An Estimated Model of Entrepreneurial Choice under Liquidity Constraints," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(4), pages 808-27, August.
- Verheul, I. & Stel, A.J. van & Thurik, A.R., 2005.
"Explaining Female and Male Entrepreneurship at the Country Level,"
Research Paper
ERS-2005-089-ORG, Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus Uni.
- Ingrid Verheul & André Van Stel & Roy Thurik, 2006. "Explaining female and male entrepreneurship at the country level," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 18(2), pages 151-183, March.
- Ingrid Verheul & Andre van Stel & Roy Thurik, 2005. "Explaining female and male entrepreneurship at the country level," Papers on Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy 2005-34, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy Group.
- Ingrid Verheul & Andre van Stel & Roy Thurik, 2005. "Explaining female and male entrepreneurship at the country level," Papers on Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy 2005-39, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy Group.
- André van Stel & Roy Thurik & Ingrid Verheul, 2006. "Explaining female and male entrepreneurship at the country level," Scales Research Reports N200510, EIM Business and Policy Research.
- Edvard Johansson, 2000. "Self-employment and the predicted earnings differential - evidence from Finland," Finnish Economic Papers, Finnish Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 45-55, Spring.
- Hannu Niittykangas & Hannu Tervo, 2005. "Spatial variations in intergenerational transmission of self-employment," Regional Studies, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 39(3), pages 319-332.
- Ingrid Verheul & Andre van Stel & Roy Thurik, 2004.
"Explaining female and male entrepreneurship across 29 countries,"
Papers on Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy
2004-08, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Entrepreneurship, Growth and Public Policy Group.
- André van Stel & Roy Thurik & Ingrid Verheul, 2004. "Explaining female and male entrepreneurship across 29 countries," Scales Research Reports N200403, EIM Business and Policy Research.
- Clark, Kenneth & Drinkwater, Stephen, 2000. "Pushed out or pulled in? Self-employment among ethnic minorities in England and Wales," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(5), pages 603-628, September.
Citations
Lists
This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.Statistics
Access and download statisticsCorrections
When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa06p380For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Gunther Maier).
If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.
If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.
If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.
If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.
Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

